Tutorials

Using the TinyMCE Editor

The TinyMCE editor is a WYSIWYG editor (what-you-see-is-what-you-get). This means that instead of needing to write html code, you can manipulate your text using an interface that's familliar to anyone who has used an email applications.

Here are some of the basic functions you can perform:

The Views Module

The Views Module provides a flexible method for Drupal administrators to control how lists of posts are retrieved and presented. By default, Drupal has this type of funtionality built into its architecture. For example, you're front page is essentially a view of the most recent posts or, when you click on a taxonomy term, you are presented with a view of all posts related to that term.

Dropdown Menus

If you're the primary administer of your website and you need spend a lot of time jumping around to different pages of your webiste, Drupal's standard menu system often makes it hard to move quickly to your destination. However, there are a couple of options for creating a dropdown menu on the top of each page that allows yourself and others to navigate quickly.

User Login with Login Toboggan

The Login Toboggan module is easy to install and gives you more control over your site's user login page.

To install the module, simply download the latest version of Login Toboggan, unpack it, upload the module folder to your server in the sites/all/modules folder. After it's uploaded, browse to admin > site building > modules to enable the module.

To configure the module, browse to Administer > User Management > LoginToboggan. Here's what you can do with this module:

Things to do after Installing Drupal

Here's a quick to do list of things to do after you've installed Drupal.

Installing Themes

Themes allow you to change the look and feel of your drupal website.  In many ways, themes are just a starting point for developing a unique look for your website.  After they are installed, themes can be manipulated by editing the css files included. 

Installing a theme is easy.  Just follow these steps: 

Basic Drupal Terms

Node: This is, in simple terms, a unit your content. It may, for example, be a story, a book page, or a blog entry.

Theme: This is the way your site is displayed (or rendered) to the end-user.

Block: This is a container for pieces of content on your displayed page. For example, your navigation menu and log-in are blocks. You may also have Recent posts, links, or Who's online.

Imagecache: Thumbnails and Gallery

In this tutorial, we have 3 goals:

1. Enable users to upload pictures and embed them into their story posts

2. Create a smaller thumbnail version of that picture that appears in the trimmed post on the front page.

3. Create a photo gallery that builds itself using the embedded images

Step 1: Download, Uncompress, and Upload Required Modules

WYSIWYG Editor (TinyMCE)

TinyMCE is a wysiwyg editor (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) - a set of tools that allow users to manipulate html without actually having to write any code. Anyone who has written an email or has used Microsoft Word is familiar with a wysiwyg editor - it's the thing that lets you make words bold, italic, underlined, etc. When publishing online, it's especially useful to create links and make headers. It usually looks something like this:

Installing Modules

Drupal allows you to easily extend the functionality of your website by installing various modules.

Please note, it's always reccommended to install new modules you are unfamiliar with on a test site before putting them into production. This way you can explore the functionality without risking your live site.

While the instructions for some modules require extra steps, installing a module is generally quite easy:

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